Supreme Court to hear plea challenging validity of Aadhaar act

Supreme court have decided to hear a plea on 3rd November which challenges the constitutional validity of Aadhaar Act and it will also ponder over the question of privacy it raises surrounding the 12 digit unique identification number.

The case will be presented before a five judge bench headed by Justice J Chelameswar which hears matters related to Aadhaar including aspect of right to privacy. As all the Aadhaar related cases has been referred to the five judge bench by the top court on 30th October 2017.

The validity of this 12 digit unique identification number was challenged by Karnataka – based Mathew Thomas concerning the privacy issues as the registration process of Aadhaar card requires biometrics of an applicant such as fingerprints, iris scan etc. He has also cited the reports that the biometrics system was not working.

All the Aadhaar related cases has been refferd to the five judge bench by the top court which is to be formed by the end of November.

This decision has been taken by the Centre who has expressed its unwillingness to extend the deadline for linking Aadhaar to various schemes to 31st March and requesting a hearing instead.

Recently, a nine – judge constitutional bench of the top court has passed a historic judgement where it declared Right to Privacy is a fundamental right guaranteed under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution

Right to Privacy is an integral part of Right to Life and Personal Liberty Guaranteed in Article 21 of the Constitution

Governments flagship program i.e. Aadhaar is undergoing a lot of inspection and challenges. Several petitions have been filed against the validity of Aadhaar card which claims that it violates the rights of privacy of a person.

Some of the petitioners in the apex court have termed the linking of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) number with bank accounts and mobile numbers as “illegal and unconstitutional“.

Also one of the counsel said that final hearing regarding the main Aadhaar matter, which is pending is necessary as “the government cannot compel citizens to link their Aadhaar with either bank accounts or cell phone numbers”.